Too Bad to Die (The Outsiders) (Dally x Johnny)
by Brooklynisosm
Summary: When Dallas Winston was arrested at the age of ten, he was a terrified boy who'd never truly known love. This is the story of the walls he built up to keep himself safe and a dark-eyed boy who was just small enough to crawl under them. :) This story is also published on my Wattpad and AO3 accounts.
1. The Freeze

**I'm writing a fan fiction on 'The Outsiders' by SE Hinton. It's kind of different from Ninjago; sorry about that. Anyway, if you are an Outsiders fan, then you have come to the right place~**

The story of Dallas Winston began in a police station and ended in a parking lot.

In that time, he lived like ice. Cold and sharp. His hair was white-blond, his skin pale and blue-veined, his eyes an icicle hanging from a porch roof. In this way he was like a Soc. He didn't feel. That meant that no one knew him, not really. They knew the idea of him. They knew his name. But they didn't know, didn't even consider that he started off as water.

His story began when he froze.

He hadn't wanted to hurt anyone.

His feet didn't touch the floor when he sat in this chair. The wood bit into his back and he tried to sit up straighter. He'd been told that good posture created a good first impression. He suspected that the blood staining the front of his shirt and his pale hands would counteract the posture.

Back then he was Dallas, not Dally. 'Dal' to the reasons he was here- those reasons being what adults called 'the wrong crowd'. He'd fallen in with The Wrong Crowd and was quickly discovering that falling included being trapped in a prison of crime and cigarette smoke, of which there was no escape.

At ten years old, Dallas was nauseated at the sight of blood. It wasn't until seven years later in a football field that this fear came back to him.

He was ten and his hands trembled with blood on them. Crying was against the law, according to his gang members. Dallas had said, don't we try to break laws? They had only laughed at him, cruelly, and said that this was their law and if he broke it he was out. They also said no whining and no caring about people.

He didn't know why he hadn't gotten out right then and there. If he had, he wouldn't be here swallowing back tears and trying to forget how to shed them.

But life was too short to regret.

He knew he was shaking and he decided that it was because the air conditioner was up so high. Up so damn high; he tested the curse word in his thoughts and found it was an accurate depiction of his current state. There were people talking outside of this room, saying things like minor and switchblade and not dead.

So he hadn't killed that man. Switchblades could kill people. He knew that. It wasn't even his switchblade. He wondered if Tim would be angry that Dallas had let that blade get confiscated by the cops. It was nice. Had it ever killed anyone?

His first rumble was a disaster.

A man came into the room. Sat down in the chair behind the desk opposite to Dallas. Looked at him, then down at some papers. Then back at Dallas.

"So." The man said.

"So…" Dallas said. He was trying to be cocky. He just sounded scared.

"Let's get this right. You're the kid who stabbed a guy."

Dallas thought that stabbed was an awfully ugly word for what he'd done. It'd been more of a jab. Stabbing entailed that the knife went deep, and stayed in. It must not have been that deep. He was only ten.

Still, he nodded slowly.

"Where are your parents, kid?"

He shrugged. His parents didn't care about him, so he didn't care about them. Maybe that was one of the reasons he fell in with The Wrong Crowd. They might have been Wrong, but they were better than home. Dallas found that the only way he could get his parents to pay attention to him was when he got in trouble. He was so starved for their gaze that he was willing to stab (no, jab, jab) someone for it.

"They probably haven't noticed I'm gone." He said truthfully.

The man let out a long, low breath that seemed to hint that he'd much rather be smoking. This would be the first police officer Dallas would get on the wrong side of. After that, the number was countless.

"I have a question for you. You're what, nine-"

"Ten." Dallas corrected. A year made all the difference. He was double-digits.

"Ten years old. What are you doing in the middle of Tulsa's gang problem, huh? What is some ten-year-old kid doing in a street fight with an obviously stolen switchblade?"

The man placed his palms flat on the table and sighed again. "Listen, I don't want to put a kid in jail. You didn't kill that boy you stabbed-"

"Jabbed." Dallas interrupted. "It was more of a jab."

It wasn't that he meant to be patronizing. But messing with this police officer seemed to be the only thing that could keep him from having a full-blown panic attack with blood dripping off his sleeve into the carpet.

"That boy you stabbed. He's in the hospital now. I'm willing to rule that it was self-defense. However, the fact that those boys in our resident cell are confirming you're a part of their gang isn't really ruling in your favor. We've picked a lot of them up before, though I'm guessing you knew that." The police officer looked at his papers again.

"Yeah." Dallas said. "I knew that. They're tellin' the truth. I'm in the gang. I ain't just some kid. I'm just as bad as the rest of 'em."

There come moments in all of our lives where we say stupid things. This was one of his moments. Perhaps if Dallas hadn't been so prideful, or if he hadn't been so loyal, or maybe just if he'd been willing to accept the fact that he wasn't like them, not yet, then he wouldn't have set himself on the path of a hoodlum. He could've had a chance to save himself from the freeze.

The truth was, stealing made him anxious and smoking made him nauseous and anything violent seemed wrong. But his life was miserable. And every once in a while, when he was with those guys, 'greasers', and he was doing something that all morality pushed against, he got this sort of high, and those were the only moments he forgot about his loveless life. It was hard to find, but being in the rumble had done that for him, and he was proud of it. Fights were kind of like swimming pools, he thought. They were cold and terrifying at first. But jump right in and you got used to the cold. Start sinking and chances are you learn to swim.

This was why he didn't deny his association to the boys who were already behind bars. This was why he proclaimed it proudly, though he'd never been more terrified in his life.

The blood in his sleeve went drip, drip, drip.

"What's your parents' phone number?" The police officer said tiredly. He was an irritated shade of gray. The lines in his face seemed cavernous. They reflected Dallas's emotional state.

"They won't answer." Dallas said, but he mumbled the number anyway. He didn't even know why, or how, they had a phone.

The officer scribbled down the number and left Dallas with his scarlet hands and thrumming pulse. His head hurt. He tasted sweat. He'd bitten a Soc. He wanted a drink of water or something…who all had been arrested? Tim Shepard had probably gotten away. Otherwise, the eleven-year-old would be in the same room as Dallas, rifling through the desk drawers by now.

Dallas just sat.

He didn't even kick his legs. They just hung from the seat like they weren't his at all- they were some dead person's legs.

There were people talking in other parts of the police station. But this room, this office, was deathly quiet.

Dallas shut himself in his own head. He almost didn't register when the tired police officer returned to the room. Looking back on it, Dallas remembered nothing about this man's face. Nothing about what he said when he came back. Nothing because he'd forced himself to forget.

He only remembered the man looking with distaste at the dark red spot that had formed in the gray carpeting underneath Dallas's sleeve. And then he was sitting on a different uncomfortable seat in a room that was colder than his previous location, staring in bewilderment at the concrete walls and thick metal bars that stood between him and the rest of the world.

He only remembered looking down at his hands, his wrists encircled by ridiculously small handcuffs. They hadn't even let him change his clothes. They hadn't even let him wash his hands.

He didn't get over his fear of blood. He just got over fear. It was impossible to get rid of, but once he figured it out, it was too easy to hide.

Dallas filed most of what he saw his first-ever week of jail in the deepest cabinet of his mind. He had to. Otherwise the papers would lay in the center of his desk, perpetually scattered and chaotic, inexplicably spattered with his own young blood.

The Ice Age began.


	2. New York

He was eleven when his mother died.

She'd overdosed. While his father sold drugs, his mother took them. Heroin and drugstore aspirin. This was why, later, when he was offered syringes, he declined. He'd ruin his lungs with cigarettes and drink until he passed out, but his mother was a cautionary tale he never told but never forgot.

He was eleven when he left Tulsa. It was on a bus with bars on the windows and filled with his kind. What adults liked to call 'The Wrong Crowd'. A year ago, he'd been scared of them. Now, they were the only place he felt he belonged.

The bus was on its way to a reformatory. There was one closer to home, but Dallas's father chose New York. As far away from him as possible. Dallas had always wanted to go to New York. He just never thought he'd only see it from a glorified prison cell.

Reform school. Ha. Tim Shepard had already been there. Tim Shepard, the most dangerous preteen Dallas knew, had only gotten more dangerous in reform school.

Dallas checked his hair in the glass between the bars. He fidgeted, thinking if he could have one wish granted right now it would probably be for a cigarette. There were no convenience stores to rob in reform school. 'What's the point of a convenience store if it's not convenient', Dallas thought, but said nothing out loud. Someone was whistling in the back. It wasn't any song Dallas knew. Sounded country.

Really, if he could wish for anything, it would be his mother living. She, even drugged-up as she was, wouldn't have let him get sent away on this bus. She would have at least argued to keep him at home. Even if she hadn't won, at least Dallas would know someone cared.

'How come every chair I sit in is so damn uncomfortable?' He shifted again and sighed, letting his head fall back. His neck pressed against the hard plastic of the seat. It was cold against his skin.

He pushed down the inside part of him that was scared out of his mind. Re-froze. This was no time to be a sissy. He was done crying.

Still, a sliver of his cold-hardened heart yearned to be a normal eleven-year-old boy. One who went to normal school instead of prison with a slightly less harsh name. One who was kissed on the head by his living mother and called son by his loving father, a boy who wore his light hair short and liked playing baseball with his friends after his normal school day, a boy who the neighbors called nice, a boy who could grow up happy. A boy who someone loved.

But that was a stupid fantasy. He was real.

Harshly so.

It took approximately three weeks from the time that Dallas Winston entered reform school for him to leave it. It was not an authorized departure. It involved kicking several teachers, breaking a window, and calling the principal a word that would get his mouth scrubbed with heavy duty cleaner had he been caught.

He laughed the whole time he was running away.

It was the last instance he'd laugh for a long time.

New York wasn't like Tulsa.

It was big.

It was humming.

It was unforgiving.

People didn't talk right. Their voices were different and wrong…strangely terrifying. Their eyes were terrifying. They were just people.

It was Dallas who was different.

But he knew he was never going back to reform school. He'd die in the street if it meant keeping his pride. He'd freeze to death as long as no one knew- his reputation would live on and that would be enough.

He would no longer fear these streets. He knew these streets would fear him.

It didn't quite work out the way he'd hoped.

He found a gang. He knew they took him in because of his fighting skill. No pity involved. There was something about Dallas that rejected pity- even skinny and sick-looking and hollow-cheeked, his pride was his defining feature. He knew he was dangerous. He knew he scared the people who saw him.

He knew that what he'd done when he was ten was a stab, and he could do it again on anyone who tried to cross him.

Hurting people wasn't that hard so long as he didn't look into their eyes. When he didn't see their pain, he could pretend he wasn't wrong. Dallas first mugged someone when he was eleven-and-a-half, and that was when he learned that guilt had to be swallowed down alongside tears. He bought himself satisfaction with the crumpled money he held in his hands after his attacks, greenish paper against pale and dirty skin. Bloodstains in his clothes and behind his eyes when he closed them were a fair enough price to pay in exchange for a meal, or at least that's what Dallas led himself to believe.

He told himself he was doing okay. He slept at allies' (he had no friends) places and sometimes even stayed in a motel for a night when he'd saved up the money. It was the closest he came to luxury- taking hot showers and sleeping in beds with mattresses and clean sheets. It was frivolous but he thought if he didn't give himself at least one bit of real pleasure, he'd lose his mind.

He ate acceptably for his circumstances. He was thin and his clothes all hung off him in a way that suggested malnutrition, but he never came close to starving. Dallas was doing as well in New York as an eleven-year-old on his own could.

If nothing else, Dallas Winston was smart. He didn't go to school, but he learned far more in the streets of New York City than he ever could in a classroom.

His problem was how alone he felt. He talked himself out of it. Wishing for someone to stroke his hair and tell him he'd be okay after he first broke ribs in a fight, when he first coughed blood onto the pavement, was weakness.

On the coldest nights, when winter came, he convinced himself he wasn't cold. Walking down the street in his worn-out sneakers, past the department stores advertising Christmas presents and happy families, Dallas didn't cry because he knew the tears would freeze in his eyes.

When he was twelve, he found a puppy.

It was curled up, a little puppy in a big box on the side of the street. He knew he couldn't keep it- he lived without a home, he could barely feed himself, and sometimes he slept under the balconies of apartment buildings, thirty feet above him.

But the dog was so small. It looked at him with the biggest, darkest eyes he'd ever seen. It was pleading- and Dallas usually hated beggars, but this…its ribs were showing, and for the first time in months he felt a spark of…compassion.

It let out a weak whimper.

He couldn't stop his heart from breaking just a little.

He reached into the cardboard box and pulled out the tiny creature. It had dark fur that matched its eyes and Dallas could feel each one of its bones. He cradled it to his chest, not even caring if someone he knew were to drive past. It was shivering.

"It's okay, baby." He whispered to it. "I'm gonna get you somewhere safe."

Talking to a dog. Living on the streets must have sent him off his rocker. But the puppy looked sad and small and Dallas thought if he didn't talk to it then who would? As long as he didn't give it a name it would be fine.

He tucked the slightly squirming puppy underneath his oversized jacket to keep it warm, then began to walk, stopping every once in a while to give it a reassuring stroke to the head. For all he knew, this dog could have rabies or some other disease dogs carried. He shouldn't be doing this.

Halfway to his current living situation- the cellar of a fellow gang member's house (spider-infested but better than outside), he realized how crazy he was being. A dog? He felt bad for a puppy? What was he thinking? He was Dallas Winston, the twelve-year-old killer (who'd technically never killed anyone but he was good enough in fights that people assumed he had). Compassion, caring… these were things he'd left behind years ago when he first made the choice to be a hood. And yet here he was, holding a puppy to his chest in an attempt to keep it warm.

He pulled the tiny body out of his jacket with intention to drop it on the ground and walk away. But its eyes caught him again- those longing, inky pools, and another pang of sympathy rushed through him like hunger.

He couldn't keep it. That was an impossibility. But there was an animal shelter across the street…maybe someone could adopt the poor thing and give it someplace decent to live. A real home.

Dallas walked the two blocks to the animal shelter and took a deep breath before pushing the door open. A bell jingled cheerily, causing him to flinch. He wouldn't admit that he was nervous coming in here. How bad he looked was an apparent fact even after not having looked in a mirror for months. He was obviously a hoodlum, and he could be chased out for that. There was the added threat of one of his fellow gang members seeing him soft. That might have been a greater fear.

The woman behind the counter looked surprised to see him- but anyone would be. Dallas was an odd sight, having not yet hit puberty but still being intimidating even when he was looking pointedly down at the holes in his sneakers.

"Can I help you?" She said, more politely than he'd expected.

"Um." Dallas said. His own voice tasted strange in his mouth. Suddenly too young and too hard for that youth. "Um." He said again, banishing his unsure tone. "The sign on your door said you accepted donations."

The woman's eyebrows rose until Dallas couldn't see them under her bangs. "Why, yes," she said, "would you like to make one?"

Dallas took the tiny puppy from his jacket and set it on the counter. He said, "Make sure it gets a good home."

He turned around and ran out of the shelter before the woman could comprehend what had happened, leaving the bells jingling behind him.

The chest part of his jacket felt empty without the warmth of the puppy next to his heartbeat. He pushed away thoughts of its big black eyes and went to find a street fight he could join.

Hurting people was a lot easier than caring now.


	3. Run

When the kid's breath was blood, Dallas knew it was too late.

Gang violence grew in the streets of New York like mildew grew between the bricks of old, musty buildings. No amount of sealant could stop the mildew from spreading. No amount of laws or police to enforce them could stop boys from killing each other.

Still, there was something strangely horrifying about being thirteen years old and watching someone bleed out on concrete. It was like falling during a game of tag as a child. Thrill to terror as the skin of his knees was scraped away. Feeling sick as he stared at the dirty fabric, darker than it should have been.

This was not a game.

The kid was dying and doing nothing about it. He wasn't too much older than Dallas. Fifteen, sixteen.

Dallas was supposed to see a rival gang member. A victory.

He just saw a boy with blood coming out of his mouth. Not an opponent. Not some villain meant to be struck down. Just a kid like he was a kid.

It wasn't even Dallas who had hurt this boy. Murdered him, he thought, sickened, then brushed the thought from his mind. And he'd seen people killed before- time and time again, shots in the head and punches that hit a little too hard and switchblades buried to the hilt in a desperate, heaving chest. He'd been the one to find his mother with empty eyes in their (ironically named) living room.

They were all going to die someday.

But no dying person had ever looked at him, or spoken to him. It was different somehow; there was separation between seeing a death and knowing a death.

The boy's mouth moved. He looked like a fish out of water, gasping, flopping. Trying frantically to find a form of salvation. It looked like he was saying, help me. Red ran down his cheek. A mess of salty blood and salty tears. Go, fish. Find your ocean.

He died.

Dallas didn't even know his name.

One of his friends had killed this boy. Not friend.

Time to get away from the crime scene. He knew how to do this. Run, but don't look guilty. Run, before the police came and arrested him again. Run from a murder rap.

Just run.

Dallas got on the next train headed for Tulsa.


	4. Dallas, Meet Gang

His father hadn't been worried about him. His father hadn't changed at all. Dallas had been missing for three years, unaccounted for in the bad side of New York, and he guessed his father's unenthusiastic greeting was a clue to why there had been no search.

Their 'house' was the same hellhole it'd always been. There was no food in the crappy refrigerator. Eyeing his father's hollow cheeks, he wondered if there ever was.

He didn't spend too much time at home.

The neighborhood became his kingdom. Soon, everyone had seen him, or at least heard his legend- Dallas Winston, the kid who'd lived on the streets of New York for three years like they were the f-ing White House and he was the president. He was different from the Tulsa hoods- meaner, colder, tougher. So caught up in the rumors that he'd kill anyone who crossed him, the neighborhood kids forgot he wasn't even fourteen yet. A kitten disguised as a tiger, his growl sent college-age kids running.

Nobody dared to talk to Dallas. And so, while he ruled, he was lonely. The only person he really knew anymore was Tim Shepard, who was now a lanky, snake-eyed fourteen-year-old living a few miles away. All the rest of his old gang was either jailed, moved away, or dead.

This changed one day a few months after his triumphant return. He was somewhere downtown, smoking and giving people the evil eye, when a voice surprised him.

"Hey!"

Dallas turned his head very slowly, his hair falling over his eyes in the most dangerous-looking way possible. He said nothing.

"You're Dallas Winston, right?" The kid didn't wait for an answer. "I'm Two-Bit Matthews. It's real tuff to meet you."

He stuck out a hand to shake. Dallas just stared at it with distaste.

'Two-Bit' laughed. Apparently he thought that stony silence and refusal to shake hands was hilarious. "You should see your own face," he said, "looks like you bit a lemon."

"Do you want me to sign your sideburns or somethin'?" Dallas said, blowing smoke in Two-Bit's face. "I ain't a celebrity."

"But you are Dallas Winston?"

"Last time I checked."

"Tuff." Two-Bi said admiringly. "Y'know, you're real famous 'round here."

Dallas shrugged.

"How'd you survive so long by your lonesome?"

"Only my friends learn my secrets." Dallas answered, placing the cigarette back in his mouth. He smiled devilishly around it. This Two-Bit guy was entertaining. And Dallas sure did like people kissing his ass.

Dallas could see the gears in Two-Bit's ginger head turning. Finally, the peasant gave offering to his king.

"You have a gang?"

"Nah." Dallas said, gauging Two-Bit's reaction.

"I know one." Two-Bit said.

"Gang, meet Dallas Winston." Two-Bit seemed very proud of himself. "Dallas, meet Gang."'

There were five of them, not including Two-Bit or Dallas himself. They didn't look very tough. But secretly, Dallas wanted to be the scariest. He didn't really care if the rest of them were wimps; all the better for them to look at him as some greaser god.

"Pleasure to meet you." Said the oldest one. He looked about sixteen or seventeen. His hair was the shortest of all of theirs and he was the cleanest, too. Could've passed for middle class or maybe even a Soc. He was looking at Dallas with a wary gaze, eyeing him with cool interest, almost intimidating in his expression. "I'm Darrel."

"Darry looks real strong but he don't like fights. He'll only pound you if you mess with his brothers." Two-Bit whispered to Dallas.

Two kids more around Dallas's age were wrestling to the side. One got the other in a headlock and said, "Name's Steve. That's-"

The other kid flipped Steve onto the pavement and placed his foot on the defeated one's chest. He smiled a dazzling smile and said, "Sodapop Curtis." He shifted more weight to the foot on Steve's chest. "Reigning champion."

"Your name is Sodapop?" Dallas had heard some pretty weird names in New York, but nothing like this.

"Yep." Sodapop's grin widened. "And my brother's named Ponyboy."

"Hey!" A younger kid, who bore a striking resemblance to Sodapop, scowled. "I was gonna say it this time!"

Darrel mussed the kid's red-brown hair. "You'll always get another chance, Pony."

"Not if Soda keeps ruinin' it!"

"Their parents are weird." Two-Bit said to Dallas with a toothy smile. "Great, but weird."

Dallas was trying not to laugh at the name 'Ponyboy'. Laughing in front of these people would not help his tough image. That was when he remembered there were five.

There was one more kid in the pack. He stood a little apart from the rest, looking almost lost. A purple bruise blossomed on his cheekbone, reaching around one of two big dark eyes. The boy made no move to introduce himself; he just looked at Dallas with some round-eyed expression.

Despite himself, Dallas's interest was sparked. "Who's that?" He asked Two-Bit, gesturing to the last boy.

"That's just Johnny." Two-Bit said. "He's shy."

Dallas caught Johnny's eyes but the smaller boy looked away, his cheeks flushing under his bruise. He looked young, as young as 'Ponyboy', but smarter. Too ragged to be innocent.

Two-Bit had been explaining something about group dynamics. "So wanna hang with us?" He said.

Dallas scanned the gang. Steve had managed to gain the upper hand once again and was now attempting to sit on Sodapop. Darrel was saying something Very Serious to Ponyboy (Dallas could tell by the expression) but Ponyboy was just giggling at Sodapop and Steve's antics. Two-Bit was grinning at him eagerly.

His eyes caught on Johnny one more time. The kid was like a burr in a horse's mane; the comb kept getting stuck. Johnny was staring at the ground with pointed interest, flushing.

Dallas leaned against the wire fence. He looked up at Two-Bit and shrugged.

"Got nothin' better to do."

"So, this guy was six five and at least double my weight, right? Just standin' there with a giant knife. There I was, eleven years old and skinny as hell, drownin' in my prison uniform. But I weren't scared, no sir. I was grinnin' like you'd never believe. Now, the guy was growlin' and I'm pretty sure he'd sharpened his teeth on that knife at least once, or he'd sharpened the knife on his teeth."

"You got in the cooler when you were eleven?" Steve said. His face was a mixture of untamed admiration and fear. Dallas had a lot of stories, most of which inspired this reaction.

Dallas stretched and took a drag on his cigarette. He could feel the pattern of the fence engraved in his back. Through a mouthful of smoke, he said. "Ten first, actu'lly."

He continued, "I've been in the cooler seven times. Three here, four in New York. New York prisons were rougher. Pretty sure I was in a cell with a murderer once, or worse. But when I was ten, here in Tulsa jail, this con, he tried to drown me. I right pounded him, knocked him out. I got respect after that. Still got a scar, right-", he tapped his back, right over his left shoulder blade, "-here."

General reverence spread through the group. Even Darrel appeared impressed, even as he checked to make sure Ponyboy wasn't getting any ideas. Two-Bit's eyebrows were raised; he was eating trail mix but as quietly as he could. Soda poked Steve and Steve shoved him, but the two then settled again in wait for more legend.

Then, a soft voice said, "Are you okay?"

It'd been so quiet, Dallas almost hadn't heard the question. In a second, he'd placed the voice to Johnny, the one with the bruise. It was the first time he'd heard Johnny's voice; it seemed appropriate to face and stature. Wispy, unsure, and strangely appealing.

The query was out of place. Too pure for such a dirty, smudgy setting with such dirty, smudgy people. Maybe Dallas had heard wrong. "What?" he said.

Johnny looked at his shoes with scrutiny, a blush making its way from his cheeks to his forehead. His hand fidgeted with the button on the cuff of his jeans-jacket.

"Jail sounds real rough. When you're that young." Johnny said, a spiderweb whisper.

Dallas hadn't been lying, exactly, about his exploits, but he'd been omitting what these people didn't need to hear. How his life wasn't fun, like he let on. How he'd almost been killed several times in jail. The first time, he'd gotten out because some other guy hadn't wanted a kid to get murdered. Dallas had done nothing to save himself, not until he was older. And even then, about half the time, he'd been pummeled. His nose was now off-center from being broken, and he couldn't see very well out of one eye; the nerves had been damaged or something.

Jail was rough. Jail was where he'd been ruined. More than on New York streets or among the company of older hoods. Half the stuff he was telling them was made up because he'd blocked the memories. Too painful.

He inspected Johnny. Bruised, battered, older than his age. No stranger to pain.

Dallas pushed his white-blond hair back from his face. Still looking at Johnny, he lied through his teeth.

"I'm great. Jail's like home for me, more home than actual home, I guess." He smiled tiredly. It had been years since he'd last slept well. "Y'all look like I'm gonna kill you or somethin'. Relax. I don't murder my buddies."

And just like that, he was part of the gang.

Still, as he recounted fantasy stories about triumphant victories over Evil Socs and Swarms of Police, he caught sight of Johnny's face. Concern was written there, an emotion Dallas hadn't believed anyone was able to feel for him anymore.


	5. Johnnycake

Johnny Cade didn't expect much from life. He was born in Tulsa. He would live in Tulsa. He would die in Tulsa. He had nothing to look forward to and nothing to lose. His parents took satisfaction from his pain, and who was he to deny them that? They had nothing else- only a dead-end job for his father and stacks of empty bottles for his mother. They hadn't wanted him, and they'd never want him. It wasn't like he was of value, anyway.

Johnny had given up on worrying about himself years ago. That was when he'd started smoking and stopped trying to fight the fate he saw coming. He would never be smart or loved like Ponyboy. Some of Johnny's friends were going to get out of Tulsa someday but he would stay this way forever: stranded and empty and scared. Giving all he had away.

He didn't worry about himself, but other people worried him very much. Caring was the only way he managed to forget. He cared about Ponyboy getting teased by kids at school because of his name. He cared about Steve fighting with his father and always being angry. He cared about Darry working his ass off to get a scholarship to a good college. Johnny loved all of them, loved them more than he could ever love himself. And in return, they loved him back; affection was a foreign concept, but he learned its meaning.

Johnny had the talent of seeing the good in anyone, no matter how bad or tough or shallow they seemed. He saw no beauty in his own life, but he found it in everything else. He didn't steal, or break laws, or disrespect girls. Hurting people was something Johnny would never do. He'd been hurt enough by his life.

The day he met Dallas Winston, he'd been slapped. By his mother this time. Her preferred medium was words, but she could lash him with more than her tongue. Her hand felt like a whip, fingernails sharp. A bruise was forming on his face, and though he had darker skin, it couldn't be concealed.

Dally was the kind of greaser that gave the rest a bad reputation. Just by looking at him, you could tell he'd been in fights and won them. He was dangerous and wouldn't do anything that helped someone else. Johnny had met Tim Shepard before, and the two, though they looked different, had the same eyes- cold and smart beyond their years. Vicious and unmerciful. Ready to do whatever it would take to get themselves on top.

It was easy to be caught up in the idea of Dallas Winston. Arrested at age ten, survived on the streets of New York (New York!) for three years, could beat a guy up just by glaring at him. Dally could do anything.

But Johnny could see that Dally was more than his hardened exterior. It was easy to admire or fear or hate him, but difficult to know him.

Maybe Johnny was just making this all up. Because Dally fascinated him. Dally was smart. Dally was tough. Dally could get anything he wanted. And Johnny wanted that. Not the girls or fear, or the breaking every law for fun. He wanted Dally's courage, his not caring about anything. Maybe Johnny was trying to find ways to relate to Dallas Winston, because when he looked at this king, this boy that people followed without even realizing it, he saw someone like him deep down. Someone who had never been loved.

It was strange, Johnny's admiration of Dally. A part of him idolized the panther ready to pounce- the Dally who took what life threw at him and shredded it in his sharp claws. But the other part saw the kitten underneath it all, and longed to give it a saucer of milk without being scratched.

The more Johnny knew Dallas, the more it convinced him that there was more than what met the eye. Maybe his adoration came from the danger, but maybe it came from the fact that inside of Dally's head, there could be another Johnny, comatose but finally stirring. It was a silly thought. Still, Johnny wondered if Dally really was okay, or if his strength was a mask over unhealed scars.

Johnny didn't smoke excessively, wanting to save money on cigarettes. But around Dallas, he got nervous and the only way he could keep people from seeing his flush was to hide it behind smoke. Why Dally made the blood rush to his face was a mystery to Johnny. He was shy, and anyone new made him a bit timid, but never had these symptoms continued for months after a first meeting.

He guessed he didn't want to betray his admiration. Everyone else could already tell. Darry had given him a lecture that Dallas was not the kind of person to look up to. _I get that you're young and he seems so tuff and all that,_ Darry had said, _but he's dangerous and he's running on a one-way track to disaster. I just don't want you caught in the crash._

Still, Johnny would do anything Dally said.

"Well, Buck Merril's havin' a party and a party ain't a party without me there." Dally said one evening, just as the sky was getting red. "Anyone wanna come?"

"Ponyboy and Soda aren't allowed." Darry said before either of the two could even open their mouths. "Second thought, you too, Steve."

"I have a date." Two-Bit said proudly.

"With who?" Ponyboy snorted.

"Whom." Darry said.

"Her name's Annette." Two-Bit said. "She's blonde."

"What a surprise." Dally said drily. His gaze turned on Johnny. "What about you?"

"I- I'm supposed to be home soon." Johnny said, staring at a hole in his sneaker.

"Okay." Dally said, in a tone that meant he was disappointed with them.

Johnny lifted his chin, his eyes meeting Dally's briefly. "But...I could...uh, walk there...with you."

"Okay." Dally said, in a far different way.

Dally walked like he owned the place- 'the place' meaning the world. He could've swallowed Socs whole like pills, and gotten high off it too. Johnny stuck his hands in his pockets. He tried to walk confidently but old habits die hard and Johnny's oldest habit was making himself as small as possible.

Johnny watched Dally light a cigarette. He must've been stealing them again because Dallas smoked probably a pack a day and he'd never be willing to pay that much for anything.

"Why're you so quiet?" Dally said. It sounded rude (everything he said did), but Johnny didn't think he meant it rudely.

Johnny shrugged a little.

"You don't talk much, do you?"

Johnny shook his head.

Dally sucked in a lot of smoke from his cigarette- he was going to kill himself if he smoked so much, Johnny thought- then blew it out fast. "Are you scared of me?" He said.

Johnny didn't answer because he didn't know what to say. He wasn't scared of Dally, exactly, though he knew he'd be a bad enemy to have. Saying 'yes' would be a lie, but so would saying 'no'.

"Don't worry, Johnnycake-" Dally's lips curled up- "I don't bite." He squinted as if in thought. "Well, not usually."

"Johnnycake?" Johnny said.

"Yeah. It suits you. Like, you ain't bitter like most of us." Dally flicked ashes onto the ground, watching them fall. The dry grass could've caught on fire. "Johnnycake."

It might've been the most affectionate word Dallas had ever said.

The two walked a little further, the sun getting lower behind trees. Finally, Johnny got up the courage to speak.

"Are you ever scared?"

"What d'you mean?" Dally said. Johnny wondered if he'd made a mistake.

"Like when you get caught by the police or thrown in jail. Do you ever get scared?"

"No." Dally said, then, "If I do, I push it down."

"People are always pointin' guns at you." Johnny said. He almost never talked this much except to Ponyboy. "Ain't you ever worried that one of 'em's gonna shoot?"

"I feel the most alive when I could die." Dally said. He wasn't looking directly at Johnny; his face was in profile, silhouetted against the bleeding sky. "Honestly. I think, no one's ever gonna do it. They're too chicken. They're the ones who're scared, not me."

He turned his head to look at Johnny, wetting his lips. "I learned in New York. I'm too bad to die."

"So you can't get hurt?" Johnny said.

"I survived my eighth arrest, and seven before that." Dally said, with a flicker of something darker behind his eyes, though his tone was laced with sarcasm. "I survived New York. I survived fourteen years like this. After that, I could live through anything."

"But how?" This time, Johnny didn't avert his eyes.

"I don't have nothin'." Dally said, spreading his arms. "So there's nothin' for me to lose."

They were there. At the party. Something loud was playing inside. There were shouts. Johnny heard something break. Everything looked hazy through the window.

"Socs could be out." Dally pointed at Johnny. "Stick to fields. Streetlights. Nowhere they could drive up an' attack you. Don't get jumped. Johnnycake."

"Okay." Johnny said. "Bye." But Dally was already gone.

Johnny walked home in fields and under streetlights. Nowhere Socs could drive up and attack him. He replayed Dally's words. "I'm too bad to die."

He thought of Dally, fourteen and already drinking. Fourteen and already a name whispered between greasers and Socs alike. Fourteen and living his life like he wanted to get himself killed.

Johnny thought about this and hoped Dally was right. Johnny Cade worried about people, and Dallas Winston was a walking anxiety attack.


	6. Damnit, Johnny

They say time passes fast when you're having fun. Dally wasn't sure if that was true or not, but he knew that his life was flying by awful fast now that he had friends. And- this made him want to throw up- he thought maybe he cared about them.

Caring was a mountain. Dallas had been at the top, above it all, for so long, but his foothold had fallen out under him and suddenly he was only holding on by a ledge. Slipping. For him, caring was like death, and he wasn't ready for either.

His new gang were the closest to friends he'd ever had. He hadn't counted on them being more than burnout hoods. Darrel was going to go to college. The Curtises had parents- not just ' _mother'_ and ' _father'_ but real parents who cared about them and fed them right and loved them. Two-Bit's dad had left but his mom wasn't gone. And Steve was close enough to Soda that it was like he was in their family, though his own situation wasn't ideal.

The truth was, he felt comfortable around them in a way that he hadn't felt in a long time. He slept on the couch of the Curtis house more than he liked to admit, and one time, Mrs. Curtis had even bailed him out. She told him not to tell anyone. "Don't thank me." She said, as he opened his mouth, unsure of what to say. "Listen, I know you think you're tough and all that, but I think you're a good kid, deep down. We get worried about you sometimes, Dallas. You're a good kid in a bad situation, and if you ever need help, you can go over to the nearest phone booth and give our house a ring, okay?" She'd taken a nickel out of her pocket and handed it to him. "For emergencies."

He'd never thanked her. But a gnawing sensation had started eating the walls of his stomach that day, a kind of wanting he hadn't known since before he'd been arrested the first time. He saved the nickel. He didn't use it to buy cigarettes or beer. And he tried to be decent to Darry and Soda and Ponyboy, just in case.

Now he was fifteen. He'd been with the gang for a little over a year. Every day he broke at least three laws. He'd been stealing cigarettes again. And Johnny Cade had a dimple in his left cheek, right under a bruise.

"You want a cig?" Dally said. He leaned lazily against the side of the park's fountain, a pack already in his hand.

"Uh-" Johnny looked up at him, a question in his face. "You sure?"

Dally struck the match on the concrete of the fountain.

"I'm talkin' to you." He said.

He lit the cigarette.

"It's your cigarette." Johnny said with big eyes.

"Damnit Johnny, just take it."

Johnny stuck out a tentative hand and Dally placed the cigarette between his fingers. Johnny smiled. His dimple showed.

Dally threw the first match in the fountain and lit another one. Soon he brought a cigarette to his own lips. The two smoked in silence for a few seconds.

"Can I have one?" Ponyboy said from Johnny's other side.

"Buy your own damn cancer." Dally said and took another drag. Johnny shot a sympathetic glance in Ponyboy's direction. "I ain't made of money."

"It ain't fair, Dally. You gave one to Johnny."

Dally said nothing. He sat impassively, his lips forming an 'o' as he blew out smoke.

"You ain't fair, Dally."

Ponyboy crossed his arms.

Johnny stretched out his arm and held out his cigarette to Pony. "You can have mine," he said, "it's okay."

"'Kay. Thanks, Johnny." Ponyboy accepted Johnny's offering with no qualm. That was the thing about Pony, Dally thought, he was used to people giving him things. Nobody gave Johnny anything but a few hard hits to the face.

That was the other thing about Ponyboy. He didn't see Johnny's bruises.

"Damnit, Johnny, you ain't ever gonna get nothin' if you keep giving everything away." Dally frowned at Johnny.

"Sorry, Dally."

"Stop apologizing."

Ponyboy observed them with his greenish eyes. He smoked Johnny's cigarette with no regret. Dally lit another cigarette and thrust it at Johnny, who took it and delicately placed it in his mouth.

"Thanks, Dally."

"Don't thank me." Dally said.

"You guys ever read Gone with the Wind?" Pony said absentmindedly.

"I don't read." Dally said. That was another thing about Ponyboy: he didn't get it. He didn't understand anything, really. He was still a kid, twelve years old or so. The only reason Dally let Pony hang with them at all was because of Mrs. Curtis. Also, because Ponyboy was close to Johnny. Sure, if Dally was ever to do something to Pony, Darrel wouldn't hesitate to attack. But Dally could take Darry. He didn't lose fights unless he wanted to.

"Ain't that a movie at the Nightly Double?" Johnny said.

"Yeah, that's why I'm askin'." Pony said. "I don't know the story."

"We could see it anyway." Johnny said. "I'll go with you tomorrow."

"Cool." Pony said.

"Why d'you dig movies so much?" Dally said, though he didn't particularly care about Ponyboy's answer. He was irritated, because Johnny was always doing things with Ponyboy. Dally, in a weird way, wanted Johnny all to himself, and this confused him, and his confusion bubbled to frustration and boiled into anger. He reminded himself to keep his cool around Ponyboy. "I mean, they're just stories."

"I d'know." Ponyboy said. "I just like 'em."

Dallas seethed.

"Oh, Ponyboy." Dally said, with fake disappointment. "Ain't it time for you to go home? I bet Darry'd be awful mad if you stayed out much longer."

Ponyboy scowled at the mention of his brother. "Darry don't know anything." But he stood up. "I guess I should head home, though. Bye, Johnny."

"Bye, Pony." Johnny said. They grabbed hands for a second and squeezed, then Pony was off and running home.

Dally stared at Johnny's hand, still seeing Pony's fingers there. All of the gang touched one another on their arms and stuff. No one ever touched Dally unless he was fighting them. He'd had a long string of girls in the past, but lately he wasn't even trying to pick them up. He could have any Greaser girl he wanted. He was Dallas Winston.

And Dally craved human contact, it was true. When was the last time someone had touched him that didn't _want_ something from him? No, he thought, he didn't crave human contact. He craved something much rarer and flightier, something he could never get, because Dally only wanted what he didn't have and he wanted Johnny.

 _Don't even think it._

Just to lace fingers with him for a second would be enough. Dally was so damn stupid. He felt like that cheesy song Socs liked, "I Want to Hold Your Hand". But that was a _love_ song and Dally didn't love and if he did it wouldn't be Johnny. He was sure. He liked girls. They were pretty. So was Johnny. Girls were _prettier_. And he didn't need anyone. He'd had a few girlfriends. Hadn't cared about any of them. And he cared about Johnny but- but it wasn't like that it wasn't like- _that;_ this was different, this caring might have made him feel a bit hotter, but it could've just been warm weather- he liked girls-

Johnny was saying something. Dally refocused his eyes, tried to ignore Johnny's damn face, and pretended he didn't think anything that wasn't what he'd say out loud.

"Why'd you give me one, Dally?" Johnny said. "Why me an' not him?"

It took Dally a second to realize it was Ponyboy Johnny was talking about.

"Cause Ponyboy can get his own damn cigarettes. You know Two-Bit'll give him one or a pack. He's twelve anyway. Little punk."

"But why me?"

"Why not you?"

Johnny flushed, and said quietly, "Cause you never gave no one nothing."

Like he was afraid of offending Dally.

Dally almost laughed. Johnny was right, of course. Dally was selfish and gave nothing he had and took things he could use. But Dallas Winston didn't laugh.

"You ain't like 'em. You're special." Dally said without looking at Johnny. He wasn't _blushing_ \- Dallas Winston, _blush_ \- it was unthinkable, laughable- he wouldn't look at Johnny.

"What d'you mean? I ain't special." Johnny said. "I ain't even different. Just not as tough. Is that why?"

"Jesus, Johnny. Are you stupid or something?"

"Yeah."

"I didn't mean it like- listen, Johnnycake, I do what I want and I wanted to give you that cigarette so just shut up and smoke it."

"'Kay." Johnny said. "Sorry, Dally."

"Stop apologizing!" Dally muttered something under his breath like ' _damnit, Johnny'_. Then he sucked in another breath of smoke from his dying cigarette. That would silence sin city, also known as his brain.

The two greasers sat at the fountain, Dally leaning, Johnny kneeling, and watched the day waste away.

The sun set like the end of Johnny's cigarette.

Dally gave him another one, striking a match like a firefly.

"Thank you." Johnny whispered.

"Don't thank me, Johnnycake," Dally said, "I'm a hood."

Johnny looked up at him. Johnny was pretty.

Girls were prettier.

Johnny smiled.

 _Don't notice the dimple._

But that drew Dally's eyes straight to the bruise.

 **It's gettin' real...**


	7. Losing the Game

Dallas Winston was dangerous, and so girls loved him.

To them he was an impossible rebel, a tragedy, a loner with a chance of redemption. He was none of these things. But Dallas let people believe whatever they wanted about him.

Girls, greaser and Soc alike, followed his trail of broken glass and smoke and hatred until they caught him. And then they stuck to him, and Dallas hardly cared if they stayed.

They left the minute they realized they couldn't change him. The moment they looked in his eyes and they finally understood that he was not the bad boy of their fantasies; that he was nothing if not cold, that the place where his heart should have been was empty, and his veins ran sharp with ice.

But before they saw his truth, they willingly fell for his lie. They saw only his passion and not the rage that caused it. They saw only his frosty outside and not what had caused him to freeze over- and they thought they were ready to help him but they weren't because Dallas had passed the point of help long ago. They dropped like flies when he had time to spare a devilish wink, devilish because he belonged in Hell, yet they forgave him for his sin and he didn't try to stop it. Perhaps that was the worst of all, that he let girls fall in love with him when he knew he could never love them back.

He wasn't movie star handsome like Sodapop, not handsome at all like any of the Curtis brothers. His attractiveness laid not in the symmetry of his face- rather, the asymmetry- he was scarred and had been in more fights than he could count. Dallas wasn't a hero, and he didn't look like one. In a movie, he'd be the rebel, or the convict, or the villain. Attractive, sexy, but not good-looking because he wasn't. He didn't look _good_.

He looked _bad_. And that was his allure. His danger, his mystery, the pain that he'd probably buried deep inside to lie in wait for a girl to dig it out and make it better.

No girl had ever gotten past one layer of Dallas. Eventually, it became too perilous for them to venture further. Girls left Dallas for better opportunities, or parental disapproval, or because they had even less fidelity than he, but mostly, they left him to save their own lives.

That was a smart decision.

He'd dated a lot of girls. The one he found himself going back to was Sylvia. Perhaps it was because she was dangerous, as well- she was wild and would do anything on a dare. But to be like Dallas was not an asset; Sylvia, like him, only wanted was she didn't have. She'd get with him, see other boys behind his back, hang on his friends while he was in jail, cry when he broke up with her _for the last time_ , kiss him once or ten times when they got back together, and do it all again. Maybe that was why Dallas kept going back to her, because looking at her was like looking at himself.

When she cheated, he badmouthed her to his friends and kissed her with that mouth later. Her disloyalty didn't really upset him. If it did, he could have ruined, wrecked, marred her. But no, if he found her with her tongue in another boy's mouth, he felt nothing. He didn't love her. Sylvia was just another game; girls were just another game that Dallas played, like his game of breaking laws or his game of slowly killing himself.

The only time Dallas had felt something at mention of Sylvia's infidelity was when he came back from some time in jail. He'd been talking with Steve and Steve had said, "Oh, yeah, and Sylvia was goin' behind your back again."

Dally, smoking, had barely even looked up. "When?"

"A few weeks ago I caught her hangin' all off Johnny…" Steve was saying something about getting angry at the two; making sure they'd both learned their lesson, but Dally couldn't hear him clearly anymore. _Johnny. Sylvia was with Johnny._

There was a great rushing sensation in his chest, like a part of him was falling through space but his feet were still planted. It felt like how he felt when he saw the Socs' money next to his own undeniable poverty, only redder, and hotter, and much more painful. It was anger but deeper, deeper than his skin and his fists- it was anger that _was_ a fist punching him in a newly rediscovered heart. Cracking that heart.

"Johnny?" Dally said and Steve visibly paled. Maybe Dally had said it in the way that meant he was going to kill someone. Maybe Dally had said it in the way that meant he wanted to kill himself.

"I told 'em…" Steve said fearfully. "I told 'em real good that it weren't good for 'em to be sneakin' around with you in jail and everythi-"

"Did anything happen?" Dally hissed, his eyes blazing.

"What d'you-"

"You know what I mean." Dally said, and now he was ice again.

"I don't think so-"

But Dally was already walking away. He threw his cigarette to the dirt, ground it in with the worn toe of his shoe. A dark cloud could almost be seen above his head- a storm was brewing.

"Where're you going?" Steve called after him.

"I didn't go and see Johnny yet." Dally said with deadly calm, his face turned away from Steve. "He thinks I'm still in jail."

"Wait a second!" Steve squeaked, afraid to confront Dally as he knew it was potentially fatal. "You can't do somethin' to Johnny! You know he's the pet, you can't just go hu-"

Dally moved so fast Steve didn't even have time to scream. In what seemed like a second he grabbed Steve by the collar and was now holding the front of his shirt so aggressively that it nearly lifted Steve off the ground.

Dally's eyes were two switchblades excited to cut. His rage was tangible but unstoppable, a tornado or an apocalypse or something else that could wipe out a town, and Steve was just a boy. Dally was Dallas now, New York Dallas, the kind that liked almost killing people just for the rush.

"I would _never_ hurt Johnny." Dallas said, a near growl at the back of his throat, a raspy certainty in his mouth. "You hear me?" He shook Steve. " _Never_."

Dallas threw Steve on the ground like his dead cigarette, and Steve didn't even try to get up. "You think I would?" Dallas said. "You think I'd hurt him?'

He turned away, his temper still smoldering, but his eyes nearly broken, "Johnny's the only thing I'll save."

Dallas left Steve on the ground, too scared to stand up. Dallas left and part of him knew his anger was nothing about Sylvia's betrayal and everything about Johnny's involvement.

A part of him wished he cared less about Johnny. It was unhealthy. He knew he shouldn't feel this way. He lit a cigarette as he walked but didn't smoke it. He wanted to do something reckless. He wanted a beer. He wanted to die.

Another part of him wished he didn't care about Johnny at all. That would make things a lot easier.

But Dallas Winston didn't do things the easy way.

He did them the illegal way.

He ended up back in jail four hours after he got out. Only for a week; his offense was minor, and he hadn't put up a fight. Smashing windows was exhausting, and he'd meant to get caught. He didn't know why the only way he had feelings was by defacing things with them. He hated everything.

He didn't know that Johnny had been waiting for his release for a month. He didn't know that Johnny was crying in the bathroom and hoping his parents didn't hear.

Dally didn't know that Johnny would lay awake every night that week thinking about him. All he knew was that he himself wasn't sleeping well. He couldn't get pictures of Johnny out of his head.


End file.
